Practice Using Your Logic

Can We Modify God’s Instructions?

            Now here is an exercise in logical reasoning. Can we modify God’s commands and slightly redesign them to meet and satisfy situations that we might find ourselves in?

            But before we start, let me say right up front that there is a huge majority of our country and within the church of Christ as well that make most of their decisions using their emotions and not with logical deduction. To these people, and there are many, it is more important to “tolerate” and “accept” than it is to defend the truth of God’s word. To tolerate is to prevent conflict. Conflict leads to disagreement and criticism of the person who dares to disagree. Today it is more important to be “politically correct” by many than it is to be “religiously correct”.  

            Here is an example I heard used one time. We all know that the Bible condemns drunkenness as a sin. But just suppose you find yourself in a remote location with no medical supplies and you need to have a leg amputated. Would it be OK to drink enough whiskey to make yourself “dog drunk” in order to undergo surgery? Wow, now that takes some special thought for a situation like that. Can you answer it? It sure is tempting to authorize drunkenness our self, even if we can’t find it authorized in the Bible. And if we can’t find it in the Bible it sure is tempting to try to find some other way, any way to get the Bible to authorize it.

            Now here’s another one. This might be easier for some people than others and granted, this situation requires you to deal with a very emotional event. Many people are tempted to disobey God and to create their own rules regardless of whether or not they have any knowledge that God approves of what they are doing when their emotions tell them to do so. For many people, satisfying their own emotional will is more important than trying to study what God has authorized them to do. Many people will disregard God’s commandments and replace them with their own actions as though they were approved by God when their emotions tell them to do so.

            Suppose you had a relative whom you care a great deal about and this person is 85 years old and bed ridden and very sick. Now suppose this person suddenly decides he wants to obey the Gospel and be saved. But he is too weak to be baptized by immersion under water. Do you feel like you could override God’s commands and baptize this person by sprinkling or pouring water over his head? Many people would do just that. What would be your logical decision about having the authority to change the way God has instructed us to administer baptism? Would you feel like this situation calls for you to disregard God’s design and allows you to design your own plan of salvation for just this one situation?

             It’s easy for someone who does not have a close relationship with this person to decide this dilemma, isn’t it? But what about a son or a daughter? This requires a strong commitment to obedience to God’s Word to follow what the Bible tells us to do.

            There are many situations that give us difficult choices and challenges to obey God’s instructions found in the Bible. And some require a strong and  firm commitment to make good logical decisions and obey what God has told us to do.

            Suppose your daughter is married to a man who is lazy and can’t hold a job? He has little respect for her needs and spends most of his time watching sports on TV or spending time with his “buddies” on their boat. Your daughter is lonely and feels like her needs are being ignored. She wants a divorce from this man and a new life where she feels she can be happy. How do you feel about this?  If there is no sexual misconduct by either party, should your daughter get a divorce? Unless she finds another husband her happiness is not likely to improve. Do you feel like this situation merits you to advise her to get a divorce? Do you feel like God would allow you and empower you to speak for Him in this special case?

            Suppose we have a family in the congregation that is very skilled with musical instruments and they give concerts and sing in many locations and they would like to sing and play for us on Sunday. It is reasoned by many that this would enhance our spiritual experience in our worship. What’s more, this is a prominent family with many relatives in the church and they will go somewhere else if we don’t let them perform. Is there not some way that we can authorize them to perform? I don’t have to tell you that this scenario is being played out in many places already. People are taking it on themselves to authorize this to happen. 

            Now if you conclude that it would be OK for you to authorize drunkenness or instrumental music yourself if the situation called for it, then you might use the same logic to authorize some of the elder’s children to be “unbelievers”. All we are told by the Bible about an elder’s children is that an elder‘s children must be “pistos”. In other words, the Bible says they must be believers. But what will we do if all of them are not believers? Will it be OK to authorize elders to serve anyway? Can we authorize that situation ourselves?

            If we can authorize these things ourselves then the next step in logic would be to authorize anything we choose if the situation calls for some kind of modification of God’s written instructions. Perhaps a young mother needs money for her children. Would that situation call for her to enter prostitution to get the money she needs? Can we authorize and excuse actions like that even though the Bible would call them sin? Can we take it upon our self to claim that God would authorize this? Do we have such authority that we can “set on the throne of God” and decide what we want to be authorized without any instructions from God?

            A well known method used to claim authorization and authority to set aside something God calls a sin and claim authority to allow it anyway, is the teaching of the Catholic Church concerning the sale of “indulgence”. Almost everyone has heard about this sinful abuse by religious people and almost everyone agrees that no such authority exists by anyone on this earth to override God’s laws.

            If we have the authority to decide for our self when we can modify God’s commands and allow behaviour that is listed as sinful (unless we decide it is not), then nothing would be a sin. There are always extenuating circumstances that can be named as to why we feel the situation we are in would merit and allow us to change God’s rules to suit ourselves. And don’t think this is far-fetched. Look at the number of religions in the world today, all teaching different and contradicting doctrines and claiming to be obedient to God’s will. They have no trouble in modifying God’s instructions if it suites their behaviour and design.

            But this is not us. We know better. Situation ethics has always been a false doctrine and still is today. No matter how bad we want something, we cannot modify God’s word to make it OK.

Carl O. Cooper